


Dragon Skin

by Feneris



Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Shapeshifters, Dragons, F/M, Shapeshifting, Wanderlust
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-07
Updated: 2014-08-07
Packaged: 2018-02-12 04:14:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2095389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Feneris/pseuds/Feneris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stoick has always feared that one day his son would find the black dragon-skin he kept in the oak chest at the foot of his bed. </p><p>He feared that his son would know immediately what that dragon-skin was for.</p><p>He feared that one day his son would don that skin, and discover he could turn himself into a dragon.</p><p>He feared that Hiccup would then fly off, and never been seen again.</p><p>Just as his mother had done.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dragon Skin

When he had been a young man, Stoick the Vast had been fearless, always ready to prove himself and do what few had either the courage of skill to complete. On that morning he had tracked a dragon for over ten miles, a great beast with four wings. The others had given up long ago, having fallen back with mutters of frustration and pointed remarks as to how the dragon was probably already half-way to Frozen-to-Death by now. 

But he had kept on, sloughing through bog after bog, crawling up cliff after cliff, and hacking his way through thicket after thicket. 

In the end his persistence had paid off, and he stood in a forested clearing, the great four-winged dragon peering down at him from a giant rock craig. He expected battle. He expected the dragon to roar, blast fire, and attack him.

He was not expecting for the dragon's claws to reach for it's neck, for silvery scales to part, and for the dragon's skin to peel off like it was nothing more than a cloth costume.

All to reveal the most beautiful woman Stoick has ever seen.

She says her name is Valka, and every day Stoick goes to visit her. Ten miles through every bog, thicket, and cliff-face. Every day, regardless of wind, rain, or snowy blizzard, just for the chance to talk and laugh with her. 

His persistence pays off. They dance and sing at their wedding with all the village watching. Berk is happy for their future chief and the new wife he clearly adores. While a few mutter about how no one knows her or her family, even the most skeptical cannot help but be impressed by her dowry: a cartload of metal ingots, stronger and lighter than steel, and a great silvery dragon's skin.

\---

Their first child is born two months too early. For all Stoick's talents and bravery, he's next to useless when the midwife arrives and so he is banished from the house. There, he has nothing to do but listen to his wife's cries and expect the worse. 

Suddenly it's the mid-wife screaming. Shrieking and crying that the Chief's wife has given birth to a dragon. 

He wastes no time, and bursts into the house. To his stunned shock, he sees Valka cuddling a tiny black dragon to her chest. But it is her lack of panic or alarm that bleeds away his worry. She looks at him, smiling with exhaustion and triumph, and without a word, she reaches under the little dragon's chin. 

Black scales peel away, and soon Valka is holding a black dragon-skin in one hand and a wailing human baby in the other. Their son.

They name him Hiccup, and when the rest of the village arrives in response to the mid-wife's cries, any rumors die in the bud at the sight of the new Chief's new, very human child. 

Stoick in turn takes that little black dragon-skin, and locks it in an oak trunk at the foot of his bed, where no curious villagers will ever find it. 

\---

Stoick has never doubted that Valka loves him and would not even consider the idea that she does not adore Hiccup. But no matter how much she likes living in Berk, no matter how much she loves her husband and son, the wanderlust still tugs at her. 

He's seen enough to understand the pull it has on her. When she had been confined to bed in order to recover from giving birth, she had become restless within a day. She became short tempered and irritable, despising anything that was "the same," right down to the boards in the door. By the second day she had finally had enough and had broken her way out through the window (ignoring the fact that the doors were unlocked and unbarred) and had taken Hiccup for a walk through the village. When Stoick had asked her, she claimed that if she had been forced to spend another hour in the room, she would have gone crazy.

Because of that, Stoick understands when she starts taking her dragon-skin and going for short expeditions. Just short ones, an hour at the most. 

Except soon these expeditions start taking two hours, then three. Before Stoick knows it, she's returning home at the late hours of the night to embrace him warmly and fuss over Hiccup with the same affection she always has.

He knows what is happening, how strong the wanderlust is pulling at her, and he fears the day the pull of her dragon blood is strong enough to make her forget everything she has here. There are times, when he awakes in the morning to find the bed empty and a note saying only that his wife has gone for a flight, that he briefly considers taking her dragon-skin and hiding it along with Hiccup's somewhere in the mountains where not even the gods themselves could ferret it out. But those moments are brief, and never seriously considered. As much as he fears loosing her, he loves his wife too much to deprive her of that part of herself. He knows deep in his heart that she could never stand to be tied down, even to a husband and son she loves dearly.

Soon days are turning into weeks, weeks into months, until one day she doesn't return at all. 

Months turn into years, with no sign of his wife anywhere on the islands.

\---

Twenty years have past, and Stoick is no longer a young man. Grey now streaks his beard, and even now he finds things wearing him down which he used to be able to do with ease.

Hiccup has grown up to be a fine son, and Stoick is proud of him. He may not be the son that Stoick was expecting or hoping for, but Stoick will readily admit that that is not necessarily a bad thing. He will be a fine chief. Maybe not the most traditional of them, but definitely a good one. He's even betrothed to Astrid Hofferson, one of the best and most respected warriors on the island.

But he has the wanderlust.

By the time he was fifteen, Hiccup had mapped nearly every square inch of Berk, down the last gopher hole. Two whole decades have not weakened it in the least, and if anything it has only gotten stronger. Only Astrid's occasional heavy hand have been all that have stopped him from trying to sneak out in a rowboat the explore the islands. Once Stoick had even woken up in the middle of the night to discover Hiccup packing a travel bag, and spouting out a plan to hire a ship to go find his mother.

The black dragon-skin still sits in the oak chest at the foot of Stoick's bed. It has grown as Hiccup has, and instead of the skin of a hatchling it is now the hide of a fully grown night-fury. Stoick dreads the thought of what would happen if Hiccup ever finds that skin. There are times when he wishes he had taken that chest and dumped it in the harbor. But that dragon-skin is still a part of his son, and as much as Stoick fears what it could lead to, he has never once made to get rid of it. Besides, Hiccup is anything if not clever, and there is no guarantee that Hiccup would not be able to retrieve it, even if Stoick did drop the entire chest into the sea. 

He knows Hiccup loves him, he knows his son loves Astrid with all his heart, he knows his son cares deeply for the village and wants only the best for it. But he also knows it is not enough. Not when compared to the wanderlust thrumming through his being. 

And one day it happens. On that day the entire village is thrown into a panic as a black dragon dances through the sky above the village. It swoops and darts everywhere, performing increasingly impressive acrobatics before flying off towards the eastern horizon, vanishing into the rising sun before anyone can even think to man the defenses. Then someone notices that no one has seen Hiccup all morning.

Stoick is standing by his bed when the search parties return, all of them baring news that they had been unable to find his son no matter how hard they searched. 

Hiccup is gone, and so is the black dragon-skin in the oak chest.

\---

Eight months later, Stoick hears news, accompanied by hysterical screams and astonished yells, that Astrid Hofferson has just given birth to a dragon. He wastes no time. Without hesitation he is storming down the hill and pushing his way through the crowd that had gathered outside the Hofferson's house. He pushes through the door without a word and strides into their home without excuse.

Inside he finds chaos. Astrid's parents are engaged in furious yelling match, with her brother's trying desperately to calm them down, the midwife is sitting on a bench furiously muttering prayers, and in the center of it all is Astrid.

She has a little blue nadder clutched to her chest, and is looking around with a look of confusion, shock and fear. Stoick finds he can't blame her for that. Unlike Valka, she had no expectations of her child being anything but human.

Wordlessly he steps towards Astrid, and holds out his arms as if to receive the child. Astrid numbly passes the little dragon over to him, the look on her face saying plainly she has no clue what is going on and she just wants it all to be over. 

Everyone goes silent, watching with dreaded anticipation as Stoick holds the little blue dragon in his arms. He slips his fingers under the little dragon's chin. 

Blue scales peel away to reveal a little baby girl with eyes as blue as both her mother's and the dragon skin Stoick now holds in his hands. A little girl that can only be his granddaughter.

Astrid takes her daughter back with an air of stunned astonishment. The entire crowd of onlookers has gone silent at what they have just witnessed. Even Astrid's parents have stopped their arguing to gape at the apparent miracle their chief has performed.

Stoick looks down at Astrid as she starts to nurse her new daughter, and as if sensing his gaze Astrid raises her eyes to meet his. An understanding passes between them.

"He'll be back," is all Stoick says, "and he'll have Valka with him." 

It's all they have to hope for.


End file.
